Sniffer dogs used in high schools

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VICTORIAN schools are using sniffer dogs to stamp out playground drug deals.

Detector Dogs Australia has searched about 50 secondary schools in the past year and found drugs in almost half, News Ltd newspapers reported today.

Government, independent and Catholic schools in Melbourne, Bendigo and Gippsland had been searched.

Drugs including cocaine, speed and cannabis were found.

"Schools are using sniffer dogs as part of a range of surveillance activities to ensure that they are as drug free as possible," Victorian Principals Association president Andrew Blair said.
Detector Dogs director Neville Williams said a lot of drugs had been found in the searches, which averaged four secondary schools a month.

There is a local school that wants to start using sniffer dogs. There has been a lot of publicity and information about it. The dogs would be used fairly randomly at the school. And they would only be used while students are in class. The administration doesn't want the dogs accidentally sniffing drugs on the students and causing problems with rights, and search warrants and such. They also don't want someone who is afraid of dogs to be intimidated. I'm not sure if they program has actually started, but I think it sounds really interesting. Personally, I would have loved to have a drug sniffing dog in the school, just because I love dogs and it is probably a Germand shepherd, and they're my favorite.

My best friend works as a counselor at a local middle school. They have sniffer dogs there every year before the last day of school. Scary enough, they dogs sound like alarms, going off every five miniutes or so! What is the world coming to?

When I was in high school, they brought in dogs at random just to sniff out the lockers. The teachers were informed the morning of, so that no kids were in the halls. The lockers and the bathrooms were checked. It happened twice each year.